Magical Mystery Tour

Written by Laure James - Editor Pharmacy in Focus

Friday, 01 May 2009 13:24

Spending hours on an all-Ireland bound coach may not sound like fun but as seventy pre-registration students demonstrated, great company and even better craic will guarantee a good weekend, however many miles are spent on the island’s motorways! Led by Niall McPartland and Chris Maguire’s exemplary organisational skills, the group of pharmacy trainees, many of whom had not seen one another since graduating, met in Belfast on one Saturday afternoon – with no idea of where they were going. “It was something of a mystery tour for our friends from university as they hadn’t been told about the journey beforehand,” Chris, who is doing his pre-reg year at Medicare Pharmacy in Dungannon, told NIPinF. “As soon as we had confirmed everyone was there, we got onto two coaches and headed towards Enniskillen.” The group stopped off for lunch at the Three Way Inn before continuing down south to Sligo. “We met up again at the Stran Bar in Sligo, where we saw Ireland beat England in the rugby, something that has been made even more memorable now that Brian O’Driscoll has lifted the Grand Slam trophy!” The students then ended up in Galway where they partied the night away and stayed in a nearby hostel. After breakfast the next morning, the group had a chance to see some of the stunning surroundings before going back to Sligo to watch some Sunday afternoon football and grab some lunch, before coming back to Belfast. “The majority of the pre-regs had been together at Queen’s University for four years and are now all dispersed across Northern Ireland so it was a great chance to see people we’ve not seen for some months,” Chris said. “We also welcomed some students who are working in Northern Ireland but studied elsewhere, such as in Liverpool. We wanted to get to know them as they’d arrived here but didn’t really know many people. “Northern Ireland’s a great place to do a pre-reg year and I am really enjoying mine although I cannot wait to qualify. I’ve been involved with the Minor Ailments Service and our smoking cessation programme but I’ve really liked looking into travel vaccines, melatonin and talking with prescribing advisors at board level.”